


It'll Stick Out

by drowninglinguists



Category: Naruto
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-22
Updated: 2017-04-22
Packaged: 2018-10-22 10:05:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10694775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drowninglinguists/pseuds/drowninglinguists
Summary: Fifty snapshots, in no particular order, of Temari of Suna's life--from her childhood all the way until she becomes Temari of Konoha.





	It'll Stick Out

**Author's Note:**

> I did a 50 one-sentence fic challenge. It's located here: http://1sentenceorder.livejournal.com/1531.html  
> Definitely an interesting challenge, but also definitely frustrating.

#1 Ring

 

His ring is cool against her cheek, a brand new sensation, and for the fiftieth time that day her heart leaps into her throat.

 

#2 Hero

 

Ninja and hero are not interchangeable; she would know--she grew up with ninja; but Shikamaru is a hero.

 

#3 Memory

 

She can’t remember the exact moment she fell in love with him.

 

#4 Box

 

Part of her is pretty sure it was over a box of yellowing and unfiled mission reports, when, instead of leaving her to do her job, he silently dedicated himself to doing half of it.

 

#5 Run

 

Like he’s finding the best things in his life are turning out to be, he doesn’t think before he runs after her and grabs her hand; all he knows is the overwhelming thought that he cannot let her get away.

 

#6 Hurriance

 

She is a hurricane because that is her jutsu and when you have one nature manipulation it  _ lives _ inside you, not unlike chakra but a whole lot more visible; with him, it doesn’t matter what kind of storm she is.

 

#7 Wings

 

His friend Chouji is all about butterflies, but all Temari can think about is how fragile their wings are.

 

#8 Cold

 

There are frozen butterflies on her dahlias; Chouji is coming over later today, so she picks them off before he can see them. 

 

#9 Red

 

Shikadai’s pajamas are red, and watching Shikamaru get their wiggling eight-week old son into them fills her heart with a joy she never knew existed; when he’s done, Shikamaru meets her eye, observes her biting her lip, and she  _ laughs _ at the way his eyebrows shoot up and the shocked and excited way he mouths  _ Really? _

 

#10 Drink

 

They don’t drink; but when he does get drunk enough that it matters, he never fails to flirt with her. 

 

#11 Midnight

 

Her labor starts right around midnight, and just over seven hours later, she gets to meet her son (no one is dead, everyone is happy, but  _ oh god _ she’s so tired).

 

#12 Temptation

 

The day she stops resisting temptation is the day of their wedding, when he at last admits to seeing through her weak excuse to touch him and simply places her hands on his chest himself--his heartbeat is quick, and there’s a smirk on his lips.

 

#13 View

 

_ The view is spectacular _ , he thinks, when he wakes up in the morning and the first thing he sees is his wife, sound asleep, clutching their son to her body, equally as peaceful as his mother.

 

#14 Music

 

The links to the Ed Sheeran songs he encourages her to listen to are saved until the very end of the day, when she plays them alone in her room just before sleep and imagines him listening to the same songs two-thousand miles away.

 

#15 Silk

 

She prefers silk--everything she owns is silk, from underwear to her favorite not-work bra to the teddy she tries to conceal her baby bump in when she’s eight months pregnant and they haven’t had sex since before she could see her toes.

 

#16 Cover

 

_ Lights off _ , she commands, using the darkness of the room to cover her newly-acquired stretchmarks and the fact that  _ until _ he starts kissing her neck she’s nervous he won’t find her quite as attractive as he used to.

 

#17 Promise

 

The difference between the sentences she’s listening to in her mind are immeasurable--the echoes of her father’s sad voice saying  _ I promise you, I did my best, Temari _ versus her husband’s amused voice saying  _ It’s a papercut--you’ll be okay, I promise, Shikadai _ .

 

#18 Dream

 

He isn’t in her Infinite Tsukuyomi--it’s her first thought upon emerging from the bizarre dream world; her second is hope that  _ maybe _ , she doesn’t love him after all.

 

#19 Candle

 

They have a blackout in the summer when Shikadai is six, and instead of telling them he doesn’t like the smell, he comes over and blows it out, not predicting the total darkness that would encompass them for the duration of the night and their lacks of extra matches.

 

#20 Talent

 

_ Talented _ , they call him,  _ to have developed your own jutsu so young _ \--Shikadai’s confused face pulls a scowl, and he promptly informs him of the jutsu’s true inventor:  _ kaa-chan _ .

 

#21 Silence

 

His father just died and she greets the news with silence; she’s standing alone with him, far off to the side of the camps from the one night everyone who survived is getting to rest, and all she can think about is the time he thought he failed his team and she looked at him the same way--maybe some things really never change.

 

#22 Journey

 

Three days is for the weak, she’s always said--even before they were dating it was two and a half for her, because she prizes efficiency as much as diligence, but now that she knows she can sleep in his arms when she arrives, she can make the journey in two.

 

#23 Fire

 

Fire country welcomes Nara Temari under the guise of a political union, simply stating that they are happy she has found happiness with one of their shinobi; it is not mentioned how she passes Konoha’s Jounin test with the most perfect score in four years (1 point better than her husband’s), and only Shikamaru ever brings up how much more comfortable it is to be in Konoha than in Suna.

 

#24 Strength

 

Strength has been prized all her life, by all of the people in her life, and for most of her it is what she has been called; Shikamaru is the first person in all her life to make her feel like her _ strength _ isn’t the most important thing about her.

 

#25 Mask

 

He gets an offer to join the ANBU, just until Naruto becomes Hokage--she’s surprised by the force with which the thought of Shikamaru willingly entering into such darkness again tears out her heart.

 

#26 Ice

 

It’s the first time she’s  _ lived _ in snow in her life; she swears--boasts--to Shikamaru that she won’t fall, but her first step outside has her landing on her ass.

 

#27 Fall

 

Her first Fall, although she quickly decides it’s her favorite season, between all the colors and the cooler temperatures that ensure she can see her breath every morning and evening, all she can think about is how the trees don’t hange in the desert.

 

#28 Forgotten

 

None of them, the siblings, will admit it, but they all know what their biggest worry is; shared mutually between all of them, they’re all deathly afraid of forgetting each other.

 

#29 Dance

 

They’re surrounded by family and friends, and far too many diplomats neither of them know personally, but all she remembers from the moment is how  _ good _ it felt to finally be married to him, swaying in his arms, with her face buried in his neck, to their wedding song.

 

#30 Body

 

“ _ You’re perfect _ ,” she swears she hears him breathe, as his lips attend to every inch of skin they can reach.

 

#31 Sacred

 

It’s  _ sacred _ , the war art of tessenjutsu, only those who are one-hundred percent of the desert can learn--this means she cannot teach her son.

 

#32 Farewells

 

Saying goodbye to her brothers is the hardest thing she ever has to do; she can’t stop leaking tears, and by the discomfort on both of their faces and the smile on Shikamaru’s, she knows more deeply than ever has that she made the right decision.

 

#33 World

 

They must be trying to assure the attendance of the _entire_ _world_ , the wedding is taking so long to plan--in their mind, they’ve already been married for months.

 

#34 Formal

 

“You’re formal,” he tells her, brows knitted together as though he’s  _ truly _ never heard anyone speak perfect Japanese, and when she demands if it’s a problem, she takes his disinterested shrug to mean that it isn’t.

 

#35 Fever

 

“It’s a  _ fever _ ,” she assures him, sticking her cool hand on her cheek; “I think I’m coming down with something,” she assures herself, desperately trying to remain convinced that she isn’t falling for him and that the way he leaned in to pluck a stray hair off her shoulder didn’t make her think  _ for even a second _ that he was about to kiss her.

 

#36 Laugh

 

Shikamaru has the best laugh--it’s deep and scratchy and quiet, and most importantly she never really heard it until she said yes; it’s a sign, she believes, that they’ll really be able to get married.

 

#37 Lies

 

“It’s not like I’m moving to Konoha, or anything,” she lifts her shoulders in a shrug she didn’t learn from anyone in Suna, “it’s just a shirt.”

 

#38 Forever

 

The word is in her vows four times-- _ I’ll love you forever, I’ll be yours forever, this will forever be the best thing I ever decide to do, and--forevermore, I am Nara Temari _ . 

 

#39 Overwhelmed

 

She  _ snaps _ at him, overwhelmed by the helplessness she feels at her inability to do anything right now, even go to the bathroom on a reasonable schedule.

 

#40 Whisper

 

When she hikes up the stairs ten minutes later with tears in her eyes, Shikamaru holds her as tightly as he is able--as tightly as he did before--despite her gargantuan belly and whispers that he isn’t angry, or hurt, that he forgives her and that he’s so sorry he made her cry.

 

#41 Wait

 

_ Wait _ , it was all she could do; wait and watch while he pushed her away, denied that he felt any which way about her, wait for her heart to learn how not to take it personally when he did.

 

#42 Talk

 

“Talk,” she says, gesturing with a tilt of her head at the mike, “you wanted to handle the exam portion, so get to it.”

 

#43 Search

 

She watches him search for something in her eyes for a minute or two, and then he resolutely nods and taps into the mike, giving the instructions--there’s no hint whatsoever of how nervous he just sounded when he was talking to her in his voice.

 

#44 Hope

 

There is a distinct moment in which she loses all hope; it comes when she asks him what’s wrong, and he ignores her, tells her he cannot use her, and stares at her long enough to let her know he’s lying.

 

#45 Eclipse

 

There’s a lunar eclipse when he’s there, three weeks before they return to Konoha to finish planning the wedding, and she takes him out into the desert, braving the possibility of storms and the giant beasts that lurk there, because the blanket of stars that was her first home is something he can’t never see.

 

#46 Gravity

 

_ Gravity, fate, destiny _ , what-have-you, it is a force of nature that causes her to fall in love with him before they have so much as kissed.

 

#47 Highway

 

The highway they build between Suna and Konoha isn’t something she tries because she  _ wants _ to go back, but it’s brand new and Shikadai is curious and she finds it enormously difficult--even more so than returning--to deny him the train ride.

 

#48 Unknown

 

The cause of her mother’s death is ultimately unknown--was it the demon inside her, was it the stress of an early delivery, or was it simply complications of normal childbirth?

 

#49 Lock

 

“It’s locked,” she reports, though they could see the giant lock from several yards away, though they suspected as much when they were sent to checkout the warehouse, but it’s been  _ that kind of day _ for Temari, and just because they reassigned Shikamaru at the last minute and it was the final straw, she decides the door doesn’t need preserving.

 

#50 Breathe

 

_ "Breathe _ ," she instructs him, resting her hand over his heart, " _ it will pass,"  _ and when Shikamaru does so, when she can  _ see _ the tension leave his body, she, herself, breathes easier.


End file.
